The Ultimate Team Summer Job: Challenge

Header on the competition's website

The Ultimate Team Summer Job: Challenge (alternatively named Ultimate Summer Job Team Challenge) was a competition held by Nintendo in 2004. The competition involved the Nintendo Street Teams, who were groups made up of Nintendo fans that partook in various stunts and activities to promote Nintendo games.

Details

For the competition, the six teams partook in weekly challenges for a chance at winning $40,000. These teams were stationed in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, and Seattle. If users visited nintendostreetteam.com and voted for the team they thought completed the challenge the best, they would be entered in the Honorary Street Teamer Sweepstakes for a chance at winning $5,000. Users were able to vote from July 21, 2004 to August 21, 2004. Users had to have a My Nintendo account to participate. The Dallas team ended up winning the overall challenge.

On the website, photos, descriptions, and occasional videos were provided to show what each team did to complete their challenge. One of the challenges was explicitly related to the Super Mario franchise, while some of the other challenges featured Super Mario-themed entries.

For the first week, the teams were to find nine people who bore a significant resemblance to a Nintendo character. For the third week, the teams were to perform karaoke as Nintendo characters in front of an audience (with the site's description referencing Mario and Princess Peach specifically), and for the fifth week, the teams were to organize a flash mob.

The Super Mario―related entries are listed below.

Challenge	Photo	Team	Description
Complete the NintendoPhoto ScavengerHunt		Atlanta	-
Complete the NintendoPhoto ScavengerHunt		Dallas	-
Complete the NintendoPhoto ScavengerHunt		New York	-
Create a Karaoke Video		Atlanta	-
Create a Karaoke Video		Chicago	-
Create a Karaoke Video		Dallas	-
Create a Karaoke Video		Seattle	-
Nintendo Flash Mob	-	Dallas	The Nintendo Street Team went to the 2004 QuakeCon Tournament in hopes of being surrounded by gamers. Thousands of gamers came from all over the world to compete head-to-head in this annual party for the ultimate prize. This annual tournament is FREE and constantly draws gamers of all kind. We found various PC case modifications that were related to Nintendo. For example, one PC case had a Nintendo GameCube inside, loaded with Soul Calibur 2. At this event, we wanted to draw as much attention as possible without getting kicked out. Through word of mouth, we organized a Nintendo cheer of "Mario! Mario! Mario!" for 30 seconds and a cheer of "Nintendo! Nintendo!" as our Flash MOB event. Gamers put down their mouse and keyboard for a few minutes in order to participate in this event. Once everyone started the chant, lots of people were distracted and came over to watch the commotion. After the final "Mario" chant, we handed people Nintendo buttons, stickers, t-shirts, towels, etc. until we ran out. The gamers loved our prizes and loved Nintendo. In addition, GamerTV.com from London filmed the entire chant and later interviewed us, curious as to why Nintendo was at the country’s biggest PC gamer party. Their interview with us should be running on a special on their network in about two weeks. As we left QuakeCon, there were plenty of confused looks on the faces of some gamers wondering what had just occurred, although many encouraged us to return the next day for more mayhem. As our first flash mob event, I guess that was the idea.
Nintendo Flash Mob		New York	The New York City Street Team thought the only appropriate way to bring numerous people into one location was through an all-out video game tournament. Contacting local video game stores and organizations, along with distributing flyers like no tomorrow, the team threw a cross genre, cross platform Nintendo tournament with games ranging from Mario Party 4, to PilotWings, to Excitebike. Held at Neutral Grounds, a local gamer destination, over 100 people arrived for the Challenge 5 Tournament while 65 competed in it. Prizes included a Nintendo GameCube signed by the NYC Street Team (1st place), a classic Game Boy Advance SP (2nd place), and most importantly, pride. The tournament was played in 5 rounds over many gameplay modes (head to head, random team matches, and style battles) which produced two very competent, versatile players, Michael Trachtenberg and Ariel Capellan. The final two had more than proven themselves in previous rounds (MarioKart DoubleDash, Super Smash Bros., Soul Caliber II, and Mortal Kombat II). In the end Michael Trachtenberg triumphed with an excellent display of ExciteBike skills over Ariel, winning the coveted Nintendo GameCube and respect of his fellow gamers.
Nintendo Flash Mob		Seattle	Being the home team has its advantages, but it sure puts on the pressure. We chose to have a Nintendo paraphernalia flash mob and invited the public to meet us at the International Fountain with their favorite Nintendo item. Knowing that we had a lot to live up to, we immediately started advertising. In addition to flyers and business cards designed by our talented team members, we had the Seattle P.I. post the date of our flash mob in the newspaper article they wrote about us, as well as a radio interview with KOMO 1000 News Radio. We passed out the flyers and posted the event on many Internet sites to spread the word. The night was set for Tuesday, August 10, 2004 at 8:00pm and nearly 50 Nintendophiliacs showed of their favorite gaming items. From Abra to Waluigi, our Nintendo enthusiasts brought it all—some interesting things were an old school Original Game Boy lunch box, a pink Game Boy Advance SP, a DS T-shirt and several classic Nintendo games, such as Smash Brothers and Mario Kart. The photo was snapped in front of the iconic International Fountain, which was a perfect Seattle landmark for the event. So fifty people wasn't a bad start, but being in the heart of video game country, we knew there were more Nintendo loving natives in the area. We hit up some at one of Seattle’s main attractions, a Mariner’s game, and corralled people to express their love for Nintendo. Hundreds of people joined in our impromptu mini-Nintendo parade, sang and danced to Nintendo theme songs and interacted with Luigi and Link who were as big a hit with the crowds as Raul Ibañez’s double in the 4th inning!